DrPinkCake
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Status update Episode 10
🕑 Added 2023-10-06 07:00:03 +0000 UTC
Long post incoming. TLDR if you don't want to read about the polishing process is that I'm currently playing and polishing Episode 10, and animations are rendering. Skip to the last section of the text if you want to read about bug fixes from v0.9.1.
My polishing process
Today, I figured I would describe my workflow during the polishing phase a little more in-depth than before. And I'll also exemplify how I've worked this past week. I've spent the better part of this week playing the game and taking detailed notes of what must be polished.
Until now, while I have worked with every part of the episode and completed all scenes, I haven't played more than a few playthroughs. There are several scenes I haven't even seen in-game yet.
In this phase of the development - the polishing phase - I play the episode and sometimes prior episodes repeatedly to improve the new content in as many areas as possible.
I play and polish in many different ways, focusing on different things each time. In some playthroughs, I focus solely on the visuals, inspecting every render and animation - spotting if something needs to be changed/fixed/improved/removed/added. I write notes in my code and then go back to fix it after I have racked up a decent list of to-dos.
In other playthroughs, I focus on the story, dialogue, grammar, and continuity and stop caring about other aspects of the game. Similar playthroughs happen for sound/music/mini-games/features/phone content, and more.
And when I'm near the end of this process, I play, trying to take it all in at once and absorb the entire experience.
My first week of polishing Episode 10
This week, I started polishing by playing some branches and looking at them with no particular focus. I tried to enjoy the episode and spot things to fix. My first playthrough was on the Jill branch with mini-games enabled. It took me roughly 15 hours to get through episode 10 while playing in a particularly meticulous way.
While playing, I actively made notes and fixed minor things, but I never rolled back to test fixes and always moved forward in the episode.
As a whole, her branch and content felt very good. Things I found that needed to be fixed after this first pass were:
- Mini-games and their tutorials
- Music and SFX
- Choices
- Details in renders
- Dialogue
- Some canon content
This is an example of a render to fix, and errors I find can be as small as this or something bigger.
This is just a reflection error on a bottle that caught my eye.
My second run clocked in at ~13 hours. It was an Others branch game where I saw many exclusive scenes yet missed some of them.
In this playthrough, I got to test a couple of lewd scenes for the first time - scenes that I posed back in January/February but had yet to play. On this pass, I found more things to fix:
- More mini-game bugs
- Bad dialogue
- DIK affinity sections that were off
- Missing music
- A missing animation
- Code that crashed a lewd scene
I made a few more playthroughs, and the to-do list grew longer with each of them. I started fixing the issues I found so I could create a new build. It's easier to spot mistakes in a build where it's a clean slate with no known issues. And that's what I'm working on right now.
The to-do list was pretty long, with minor to major things that must be fixed. After I have fixed everything, I will continue playing more with other types of branches and combinations. Rinse and repeat the process in different ways.
My thoughts on this process
And this is what my polishing process is all about and how I've done it for years. At first, the episode will feel very rough, but with each pass, it improves.
The funny and sad part about this is that even though I do this phase countless times for different branches and combinations, I will still miss things. Eventually, my brain grows accustomed to errors, and I can't spot what's wrong within a scene until it gets pointed out to me by someone else. Even something you would say is a glaring issue/error might slip through. But at some point, I will feel I've done what I could to polish the episode. And when I reach that point, and all art has been rendered, I use my team of testers and proofreader for the extra polishing step.
Even after all of that, the release will still have bugs, typos, and occasional errors, but it will be in a state where it's good enough to be released to Patrons and have considerably fewer bugs than it would have if I skipped the polishing phase.
I carry out this meticulous polishing process because I don't want players to be the game's beta testers. I don't think it's fair to put out an episode that hasn't been properly tested after all this time and causes big game-breaking bugs.
It might still happen, and I will kick myself for every single bug that slips through, but at least I can rest well knowing I and my team of testers did the best we could.
This is what I'll do in the upcoming weeks, and I'll try my best to report how it's coming along and what areas I've been working on.
List of fixed bugs
If there is a bug in the Interlude or Episode 9 (v0.9.1) that you are aware of but don't see on the list below, please report it on my Discord server in the bug-reports room, and I'll fix it for this upcoming release.
These are the bugs that have been reported and fixed for v0.10.0 so far, any other bugs you know of, I am unaware of:
- Fixed a bug where the CHICK response on Elena's cluck would subtract one from the total number of CHICK actions instead of adding one.
- Fixed a bug with the Below Budget perk, which increased the starting budget of the Halloween party by $5.
- Fixed an issue with Sarah's and Melanie's optional event in the final free-roam event.
- Fixed an issue with Sarah's optional event in the second free-roam event.
- Fixed an issue with the timer hampering performance during the drawing mini-game in the Interlude.
- Fixed an issue where a scene with Becky could happen after the first party activity. Now, it only triggers before this activity as intended.
- Fixed a bug where save names sometimes reverted to old save file names.
- Fixed a bug with the Wallpaper setting in the Settings app during the end of the Interlude that caused a crash.
- Fixed an issue where Maya's lewd scene was stored incorrectly.
- Fixed a bug with the truth or dare game that caused an omission of truth when asked how many you've slept with.
- Fixed an issue with Lily's gallery scene, causing an emote to misalign the text chat.
- Fixed an issue with Lily's lewd scene where her tattoos were missing.
- Updated the description of the Multiplier Madness perk. It worked as intended, but its description was off.
- Corrected typos
Have a nice weekend
Dr PinkCake
Comments
John Ohara
Would be nice to make small changes for the load/save process for scenes. Not sure about everyone else but I can't even remember the countless times I've overwritten saves because of how the process is. I know there is a warning dialog that appears when after loading or saving slots but the process is too similar. I suppose its not a big enough deal, but in all my years of using programs including some computer games (probably a couple of hundred or so) I've never come across one single program where it was incredibly easy to over write something inadvertantly. I must have had to go backwards and replay same paths more than 30 times already. I really like this game but its getting really too frustrating having to keep doing the same thing over and over again. Its getting to the point that I may just toss this game and its getting too repeatative.
Kudlak
Only full season for steam/gog
Shinororororo β€οΈ
If this comes out (not meaning to rush) will it be coming to steam as well or is it on a different time frame release..
James Poe
$5 tier if you have the main game from Patreon.
Sputnik2000
does anyone know if i need to join the $20 tier to play the game? i have joined before and have the main game up to episode 8 i believe - thanks
ezPI
I gotta say, your whole game development process is impressive - even compared to some larger game devs out there. Not using players as beta testers is an admirable choice, even though I personally would be honored to beta test such a great game. I appreciate your hard work, Dr. PinkCake!
Targonis
To be fair, the game engine makes this stuff a lot more direct than most games with a 3D engine. Now, DPC is amazing for all the attention to detail when it comes to all the branching storylines and choices as well as taking pride in a polished product. Just keep it in perspective that different game designs and engines are going to have their own challenges. A fully 3D game engine has some really big challenges when it comes to finding the source of problems.
A10forthewin
I did not know there was extra content based on MC name - can you please give example of the MC names used for this - I would like to see this - Thanks --- or where did you find out about this?
Patrick SΓΈlvberg
Its actually crazy how a pron game developer is more on it than all of the big triple A developers when it comes to polishing and making sure their game is ready rather than just pushing it out as fast as possible. And even goes as far as beta testing it himself rather than have the players pay to be beta testers. I applaud you Dr. Pinkcake, you truly are one of a kind in the gaming industry.
Targonis
The big challenge is how many branches and choices lead to different scenes or different dialog(even for the same choices). I don't know of ANY other game that has this much variation based on player choice. Even naming the MC certain names has some different stuff that shows up from time to time.
When will ep 10 be ready to play. Thanks for the detailed work so far, its been a while since a game story touched me this deep.
Nordwolf
Keep your dedication for all this details. This is what makes your game so good!
Thanks for all your efforts DPC
Marshall Iblis
I'm so ready for the new update. It's been almost a year.
Scott
You do know that is from 1-10 right?
Jarne
10 to 15 Hours? HOURS? Wtf? Impressive!
A10forthewin
It all sounds great sounds great - have a great weekend
Esteban11
i don't mind being the beta tester haha, but congrats, you've worked hard on this. so excited for episode 10.
Blacklabyrinth
I see what you did there Achilles.
SludgeMan
Imagine a world where other devs bothered to play their own games before releasing them. What a magical place that would be.
Blacklabyrinth
Love these peeks at the inner workings. Great job DPC
Jono Say
You spelled Elena wrong lol
Scott
I'd like to have a chance to bang Kylie.
Arta
Great stuff DPC. Enjoy your weekend
Sadie Adler
Appreciate the info! Could we get some information bout the Bella branch too in next status update? π₯Ίππ»π³
Nightwing
hurm ET release?
Jdog
YOU ARE THE MAN DOC!!!!!! have a good weekend!! im gonna do another neutral playthrough lol
Tuor
'Code that crashed a lewd scene' << This must be fixed RIGHT AWAY! :P
DolphLundGrenGun
<3
Rellik6801
This is the gold standard that other devs Try to reach. !
Scott
Sounds like a lot of work Doc. It also clears up a question I had about ep10. Very insightful post. Yet another thing that makes you the best dev out here. Have a great weekend.
